Wednesday, 18 January 2012

This week we started working at the Unicorn Theatre on our site specific project taking place this June. Using the stories that were created through workshops in Primary Schools over the autumn, we have been seeing how these can be turned into mini performances with the help of Unai, Carly and Kieran as well as Cath and Jenny from The Unicorn, Tina our set designer, Ella and David.

Saturday, 14 January 2012

We went out of town close the coal mine and met up with Sebastian from the Green Dog Sled company and kitted up in huge snow suits for a morning of dog sledding.

We were very warm in the hut but it was very cold outside.

Liz really loved the dogs and led the way with helping to get them ready for our trip. we had two sleds one with ten dogs and one with eight.

It was hard to take an pictures out on the snow because it was so dark, even though we were put at 11am in the morning. Here is the best of them.

Martin was driving me on the way out into the valley. I was in charge on the way back.

It was a fantastic experience and had a huge impact on us. We were far far away from any signs of human life. After the initial symphony of barking and howling at the start it was almost silent and very beautiful. (this is not so clear in the pictures so you have to take my work for it)

I was very keen to look for the Northern Lights, so keen that I nearly fell of the sled and had hang on with one hand and apply the breaks. I think the dogs knew I was an amateur.

At the end we felt like real arctic explorers. It was a really great way to travel up here.

Wednesday, 11 January 2012

We spent the day at Longyearbyn Kultur Hus working together. We spent a lot of time talking and reading about S A Andree's doomed attempt to reach the north pole in 1897 in a balloon. This has become a bit of an obsession. We tracked his full journey, three days by balloon and then many many weeks over the ice.

We also spent some time looking at Strindberg's pictures from the expedition which he took with a special camera of his own design. The undeveloped negatives survived the crash, the torturous trek over the ice and 30 years frozen on a small island close to Svalbard.

At midday we went outside to see if the sun had come up.

It had not.
We will head out after dinner to see if we can spot the Northern Lights again.
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Tuesday, 10 January 2012

We went out for a walk in the town of Longyearbyen and in the very clear sky we could see the northern lights. Martin and Elke tried to take pictures. This is about the best of them. The moon was very bright so it was not as easy to see the northern lights as on a moonless night. But at least the sky was clear.

I saw a bear asleep at its desk in the Spitzbergen Travel office.
Liz came back wi rosy cheeks......